Yeadon nursing home hit with wrongful death lawsuit

MEDIA – A Philadelphia woman alleges a Delaware County nursing home was negligent in contributing to what she believes was the wrongful death of one of its residents last year.

Martha Young (acting as the Administratrix of the Estate of Nellie Louise Howard) filed suit on Jan. 26 in the Delaware County Court of Common Pleas, against ManorCare Health Services At Mercy Fitzgerald (doing business as Mercy/Manor Partnership), of Yeadon.

“Nellie Louise Howard was admitted to residency at ManorCare on or about May 13, 2014, with various diagnoses including, but not limited to, a urinary tract infection, gait dysfunction and rheumatoid arthritis,” the suit says.

The suit says Howard was in need of 24-hour care, due to having difficulty walking, a history of falls, dementia, muscle weakness and unstable balance, among other maladies – but detailed a number of occasions over the following two years where Howard was found on the floor next to her bed, or that she had fallen from her bed.

Ultimately, Howard fell on Feb. 25, 2016, sustaining a fall so severe it required her to be transferred to the Emergency Department at Mercy Fitzgerald Hospital – and leaving her as having suffered a transverse fracture massive anterior osteophytosis with extension into the C4 vertebral body extending through the anterior column into the middle column, a breach of the posterior cortex and a preseptal hematoma on her face.

Howard stayed at the hospital until March 3, 2016, at which time she was returned to ManorCare’s hospice care unit, until she passed away on April 22, 2016, resulting from complications linked to cervical fracture, pneumonia and dementia.

Young alleges the facility’s negligent care led to Howard’s untimely death, and asserted claims of negligence, negligence per se, survival and wrongful death in the litigation.

The plaintiff is seeking damages in excess of the court’s jurisdictional limits of compulsory arbitration limits.

The plaintiff is represented by Thomas J. Bass of The Law Office of Thomas J. Bass, in Philadelphia.